A Bachelor Husband Part 64

"As you insist on my mounting the pulpit," Feathers said, rather wearily, "I'll repeat an old chestnut of a proverb which says that it's never too late to be what one might have been, or words to that effect. Have a Scotch?"

"No, thanks. I went home too merry and bright the night before last, and Marie was waiting up for me." Chris avoided his friend's eyes. "It's not a thing I often indulge in, you know that," he went on, gruffly, "but I felt like the devil that night."

Feathers made no comment, but he thought of Marie with pa.s.sionate pity. He could understand so well what a shock it had been to her to see Chris the worse for drink--realize just how she would shrink from him.

The clock struck twelve, and Chris rose reluctantly.

"Well, I'll be off." He hesitated, then added, with a touch of embarra.s.sment: "Thanks awfully for what you've said. I'll remember; I'll speak to her in the morning, and see if we can't patch things up." He went to the door and came back. "You--er, don't tell her I said anything about it to you."

"Of course not."

Chris went home full of good resolutions. He lay awake half the night, plotting and planning what he could do in the future to make amends. Though he did not love Marie, it seemed a dreadful thing to him that they were in such mortal danger of drifting finally apart.

He fell asleep, meaning to have a good, long talk with her in the morning and try and straighten out the tangle.

But Marie did not appear at breakfast, and in reply to his inquiries the maid told him that Mrs. Lawless had a bad headache and was going to stay in her room.

"To avoid me, I'll be bound," Chris told himself savagely, and his good resolutions began to waver.

What was the use of trying to turn over a new leaf when she refused to help him? What was the use of throwing an insufficient bridge across the gap between them which would only collapse and let him down again sooner or later?

It was a lovely morning, and he thought longingly of the golf links. Twice he went to the 'phone to ring up a friend to join him, but each time he wavered, and at last in desperation he went upstairs to his wife's room.

She was lying by the window on a couch, her dark hair falling childishly over her dressing-gown, and she started up in confusion when she saw Chris.

"I did not think it was you; I thought you had gone out."

"No." He saw the marks of tears on her face, and his heart gave a little throb of remorse. She was only a child, after all, as Feathers had said.

"I am sorry your head is so bad," he said gently.

She turned her face away.

"It's better; I am coming down to lunch. I haven't been sleeping very well lately."

Chris sat down beside her. There were so many things he wanted to say, but he had never been eloquent, and this morning his tongue seemed more stupid than usual.

It was only after some minutes' silence that he blurted out: "Look here, Marie! Can't we start again? I'm most awfully sorry things have gone wrong like this, and I know it's my fault. Last night I thought it would be the best thing if I cleared off and left you for a year or so. I thought perhaps it might be all right later on if I came back, but I've changed my mind, and ... look here--will you forgive me and let us start again?"

He laid his hand clumsily on hers, the hand that wore his ring.

"There's no earthly reason why we can't be happy and get along splendidly," he urged. "I know I'm a selfish devil, but I've always been the same. But I'll try--I'll try all I know if you'll give me a sporting chance."

He waited, but she did not speak, and he went on: "We've seen so little of each other lately--my fault, too, I know--I wish I'd taken you to Scotland with me."

"I wish you had, too." The words broke from her lips bitterly. So much might have been averted, she knew, if only Chris had taken her with him.

The color mounted to his cheeks. Even her voice had changed lately, he thought. There was something hard in its soft tone that vaguely reminded him of Mrs. Heriot.

"It's not too late now," he urged. "There's lots of places you've never seen that I'll take you to! Heaps of shows in London that you'd thoroughly enjoy... ." He waited eagerly. "What do you say, Marie Celeste?"

She did not know how to answer. If he had made this offer a month ago she would have accepted it gladly, but now it did not seem so very attractive.

"We might give a few little parties," Chris went on vaguely. "Aunt Madge won't mind, or if she does--we'll set up a show for ourselves. You'd like that, wouldn't you? You'd like pottering about in a house of your own."

She nodded. She could not trust her voice.

"Is that a bargain, then?" he asked happily. He had so often got his own way with her that it never entered his head that he might not be going to get it this time. His fingers tightened over her hand. "Say it's a bargain, Marie Celeste, and be friends with me again."

She turned her head slowly and looked at him.

His eyes were very eager and anxious, but for the first time in her life Marie's heart was not at his feet, and she was not conscious of any desperate longing to drive away his anxiety and agree to what he wanted.

"What are you thinking about?" he asked sharply.

He was beginning to realize that it was not only her voice that had changed and the expression of her eyes when she looked at him, but the girl herself; that she could no longer be coaxed and bullied by him--that she was a woman with a will of her own in her soft frame.

"I was thinking." she said slowly, "that I will agree to try what you suggest, on one condition ..."

His face brightened.

"Anything, of course! Anything you like." He was sure that she could not be going to impose anything very hard.

It came, therefore, as something of a shock when she said: "I will do as you suggest, if--at the end of a month, we find we can't get on any better, and--and be happy ... you will let me go."

He echoed her words blankly.

"Let you go! What do you mean?"

The sensitive color flew to her face, but she answered quite quietly and steadily:

"We could get a divorce--I don't think it is called that--but I know we could get a divorce--I--I've found out all about it."

Chris sat staring down at the floor. There was a dreadful feeling somewhere in the region of his heart, for he had never believed that she could be so hard and implacable.

She was not yet twenty, but she was calmly proposing to annul their marriage, if, at the end of a month, it still proved to be a failure.

He put her hand roughly from him and rose to his feet.

"You don't know what you're talking about, and I refuse to agree--I absolutely refuse." He began to pace the room agitatedly.

Marie watched him with hard eyes, then suddenly she said:

"If it's the money you're thinking about ... I don't want any. I don't mind not having any. Aunt Madge would let me live with her; we could live quite quietly; it wouldn't cost much."

He turned scarlet.

"The money--good lord! I've never given it a thought." He swung round and looked at her with pa.s.sionate eyes, and it slowly dawned upon him that there was something very sweet and desirable about Marie Celeste as she sat there in her blue gown, her soft dark hair tumbled about her shoulders, and her brown eyes very bright in the pallor of her face.

With sudden impulse he went down on his knees beside her and put his arms round her, holding her fast.